Open AccessClimate change projections for sustainable and healthy cities
Author(s) -
C. M. Goodess,
Sarah Berk,
Satyaban B. Ratna,
Oscar Brousse,
Martin Davies,
Clare Heaviside,
Gemma Moore,
Helen Pineo
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
buildings and cities
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2632-6655
DOI - 10.5334/bc.111
Subject(s) - urban heat island , climate change , climate model , urbanization , sustainability , urban climate , beijing , climatology , environmental science , geography , environmental planning , meteorology , china , economic growth , geology , ecology , archaeology , economics , biology
The ambition to develop sustainable and healthy cities requires city-specific policy and practice founded on a multidisciplinary evidence base, including projections of human-induced climate change. A cascade of climate models of increasing complexity and resolution is reviewed, which provides the basis for constructing climate projections-from global climate models with a typical horizontal resolution of a few hundred kilometres, through regional climate models at 12-50 km to convection-permitting models at 1 km resolution that permit the representation of urban induced climates. Different approaches to modelling the urban heat island (UHI) are also reviewed-focusing on how climate model outputs can be adjusted and coupled with urban canopy models to better represent UHI intensity, its impacts and variability. The latter can be due to changes induced by urbanisation or to climate change itself. City interventions such as greater use of green infrastructure also have an effect on the UHI and can help to reduce adverse health impacts such as heat stress and the mortality associated with increasing heat. Examples for the Complex Urban Systems for Sustainability and Health (CUSSH) partner cities of London, Rennes, Kisumu, Nairobi, Beijing and Ningbo illustrate how cities could potentially make use of more detailed models and projections to develop and evaluate policies and practices targeted at their specific environmental and health priorities.